For gaming, the participants often form a group consisting of three or more users. In order to be successful in the gaming they need to communicate with each other typically by connecting their devices together wirelessly or wired. Currently the voice is captured in mono (one channel) and distributed to the other participants in the group as a mono signal. When mono is played back over stereo headphones the mono voice signals will appear in the center of the receiver's head also known as lateralization. At the same time, and since the voices of the other participants are also distributed and received in mono, all the voices of the group will appear in the same lateralized position inside the receiver's head. If all the group participants speak at the same time it can be hard to separate the voices from each other because of the lateralization and therefore important information may be lost.
The same problem appears in regular communication systems, such as Skype, Lync or other kind of telephone communication systems. In a conference call situation, the users/participants talk at the same time and which makes is hard for the participants to separate the voices from each other because of the lateralization and therefore important information may be lost.
The aim of the invention is to overcome above mentioned lateralization and enable each of participants in a group to position themselves in a virtual sound environment which when received and played back over stereo headphones the voices from the participants are separated in the virtual sound environment making telephone conversation easier to understand.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,602,892 B1 centralizes all audio from each gaming console and distributes it out to each individual user. This is a complex setup and does not allow each individual user any controls. The solution requires a technician as also described in the patent to control the sound distribution in the system.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,571,695 B1 discloses a communication daisy chaining which is a relatively simple method to achieve game chat audio sharing. The system offers little control for each individual user, specifically there are no controls of the sound level of the microphone signal from each individual user that is sent over the daisy chain connection.
There is a need to provide a solution that addresses at least some of the above-mentioned problems.